


Creating Death

by bruvebanner



Category: Hawkeye (Comics), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Incredible Hulk - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Anxiety, Apocalypse, BAMF!Clint, Depression, Gore, I literally write about lots of gross stuff so if that's not cool with you then this is a no go kay?, M/M, Mad Scientist!Bruce, So Okay, Suicide Attempts, Violence, Zombies, i guess i dunno like i've never written gore before woops, suicide references, things like that okay i write about dark stuff i guess, uh anything else?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-11
Updated: 2014-07-11
Packaged: 2018-02-08 02:50:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1923936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bruvebanner/pseuds/bruvebanner
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's the End. Well, it's been the End for five years and Clint Barton has been coasting through it as best as he can. As far as apocalypses go this one's pretty tame, you could say. The Infected are slow, mindless, and hungry, and they fall apart pretty fast; not like they can climb up to the roofs, where Clint is wont to hide. So life after Death seems pretty good for a guy like Clint; that is, until a strange Doctor comes stumbling out into the streets of New York, covered in blood, and runs straight into a horde of Infected. Now Clint has a charge to watch over in the form of some half-breed, malnourished loon who keeps babbling about a cure.</p><p>Isn't that just his luck?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Creating Death

**Author's Note:**

> So, basically, as it says in the tags; I write about death and suicide and stuff in this. I don't want anyone to feel bad reading this, so if you're not cool with that please don't read on. But if you like zombies and hulkeye, be my guest, and please enjoy!

Two lovers sat side by side, one in a hospital bed, tubes and machines all around, beeping and dripping with tedious frequency, the other in a hard, plastic chair, gripping a needle in pale hands and staring at the blank wall across from them. His fingers trembled, and his knee jiggled up and down in anticipation.

And the IV dripped on.

 

 “It will work.” There was determination in the words, but also fear, and a wavering uncertainty. It went ignored.

 

The needle was slotted into the crook of the bedridden lovers’ elbow, quick and precise, green liquid pushed into blue veins, spreading up the thin, pale arm, fanning like tree branches until it faded once more to blue. And then it was taken out, and a second needle was pressed gingerly into the second lovers’ wrist, acidic burn spreading slowly up the man’s arm.

 

“This will work,” he whispered softly, leaning over to grip his lovers trembling hand, watery smile spread on his face as the words he cannot say spread out between them in the pregnant silence. _Or we will die together._

 

He never thought, never in all of his uncertainties and theories, in all the nights and days spent laboring over a cure for death, that he would be so wrong and so right all at once. The injection worked well for him, that acid pressed so deeply into his veins, mingling with broken genes to create perfect symmetry, saving him from his own infection in the world; but for his lover? There was no saving her once the injection flowed to her brain, turning reasoning and thought to black, incandescent blots of viral strain, and creating a monster far above any fictional creature.

 

Why was he immune? Why was he spared? He would never know; all he would know is that his lover tried to rip his throat out with her teeth and the world burned because of his desperation for immortality and his fear of being alone.

 

* * *

 

 

The heat of the sun baked down on the empty streets of New York, bathing the cracked asphalt in wavering, burning light, mirages rising in the distance like tantalizing secrets, hidden hopes brought to life by the fires of high noon.  All was silent, still; the breath of life had long gone from these desolate roads, abandoned after The End had begun five years before. Skyscrapers were crumbling; apartments were burnt to cinders, or left half scorched by the flames of desperation and human anarchy. Plants grew like tendrils of hope, colouring the barren city with the spark of new life, as unruly and shaky as it may have been.

 

Nothing stirred on the arid lanes, sans the tumbling litter that fluttered in the whispered breeze, like the death rattle of the Earth blown out, slow and ominous.

 

All was still. All was silent.

 

Until a figure cut from the shadows of a thoroughfare like a macabre puppet cut loose from its strings, sauntering out and casting its ghastly shadow across the way, ragged breathing and a sickly, wet drag of broken flesh over stones the only sounds it emitted.

 

Its limbs were off, like a doll with its parts sewn on backwards, flesh pulled too tight over the bones, one leg twisted and broken; the sound coming from its mouth was a mix of a moan and a snarl, some guttural utterance of pain and incomprehensible hunger, a record scratched in all the wrong places put on loop.

 

It was a wonder it could make any sound at all; a gaping hole took up one half of its face, some burnt, horrendous wound festering and exposing blackened teeth and a purpled, deadened tongue, wagging like some venomous creature with each new, garbled groan. Ashen flesh, milky, unseeing eyes, tattered clothes falling off of a skeletal frame; the figure held all the markings of The Infected. And where there was one, there was always more to follow.

 

Perhaps it smelt life on the air; perhaps it had simply wandered in its mindless stupor onto this particular street. Perhaps somewhere within that broken, tainted brain, it had remembered the feel of the road, the slope of the roofs, the glint of the windows that surrounded it.

 

No one would ever know, because no one would ever ask. The only good Infected was a dead Infected, after all.

 

As it shuffled, listless and distant, a bell began to sound a short distance down the way; a bell, silver, glinting in the sunlight, tolling like the call of God to His scattered flock, and like a sheep under his masters call, the Infected lifted his head, those far off eyes flashing with the only spark of life it possessed.

 

 

It turned with haste, low, croaking moans turned to more fervent, frantic lamentations, and its shuffling turned to a limping sprint, broken limbs loping towards the promise of flesh and gore. With the tolling of that bell came something else, as well; a scent, tossed on the breeze like so much careless trace—the smell of blood, at first faint, unperceivable even to the precise senses of an Infected, and then growing steadily stronger, until the promise of rent flesh and broken bones was the only conceivably viable reason such a strong scent would permeate the lackluster breeze.

 

The closer the Infected came to the bell, the more persistent the tolling became, until it was no longer tolling but frantically clanging back and forth, back and forth, a zealous beckoning, a beacon din of noise and smell of carnage.

 

Many things happened very quickly when the Infected came level with that glittering bell, some cadaverous film shutter-shot under the light of the damning sun; the tolling stopped, a blanket of silence descending ominously over the chilling scene; a flurry of motion, almost too fast to track with the eye, descended from the shadows behind that bell, some white bat from the pits of hell flying out; the Infected lifted its head, ruined mouth agape, as though awaiting the flesh it so craved; and then it was on the ground, shrieking and gouging with broken nails and bloody fingers, gnashing its blackened teeth as its eyes roved wildly in its skull.

 

A needle plunged into its throat, green liquid forced into closed veins and dead muscles, and the figure above the corpse loomed like an avenging angel, breaths slow and even, expression serene in the face of the Devil’s creation.

 

Green flowed from the injection sight and out, almost glowing as it poured through the lifeless tissue, flooding numbed nerves and washing like a cleansing rain through the tainted body; the struggling began to subside, the unconscious form jerking and twinging with each new wave of the foreign substance. The groaning cut off, replaced with a slow, dragging breath, air forced into damaged lungs, inflating like a pair of leaking balloons.

 

For a moment, the Infected’s ashen flesh seemed to tint with life as its body bloomed, chest heaving, unseeing eyes blinking up at the glaring sun, and triumph radiated from the individual above it, fingers uncurling from the needle, thin, gangly body moving to sit back on its haunches as it watched its work unfold.

 

It seemed to be working, if life was the intended effect; seemed to be working, at least until the corpse arched up, fit to snap its spine, screaming as it clawed with broken fingers at its heaving chest, blood pouring out of its mouth like a torrent of black ichor, grey eyes rolling up into its skull. The blood splattered across the pale face of the injector, staining clean cheeks and white clothes with ruddy gore as the figure went scrambling back and away, watching in disgust as the Infected spluttered out its putrid viscera, convulsed like a snake on a bonfire, and then went still, limbs sprawled out across the asphalt.

 

Trembling, bird-boned hands wiped at the sprayed blood, a soft, whimpering noise of revulsion and fear building behind quaking, chalky lips.

 

He had failed. Again, as he sat in the heat of the unforgiving sun, covered in black, rancid blood, with a broken, decaying body sprawled out before him, he had failed. What formula had been wrong, what chemical he had over, or under, dosed, what preparation he had failed to bring to mind; it didn’t matter, for he had failed, failed like he had a hundred times before, since the very first day, since the Beginning of the End, failed and failed and failed once more, with countless other bodies left motionless and useless by his hand alone.

 

The shivering had begun to spread across his whole body, turning him into a quivering, shaking mess of blood and spiraling disappointment, and as the world came once more crashing down on him, and the breeze began to send the scent of death his way, he bent to the side, dry-heaving in between panicked sobs.

 

His body twisted and he beat a fist to the ground, crumpling in on himself, and when he finally lifted his head, tears streaming in rivulets down his face, he snarled out a scream towards the accursed sky, green eyes flashing like poison in the sun.

 

* * *

 

 

High above the city, an ever present sentinel held silent vigil; a gargoyle perched atop an iron railing, booted feet firmly planted as one hand gripped the banister and the other held onto a white oak recurve bow, sleek and handmade, grooves worn into its glossy grain. This guardian was a ragged creature; his clothes were tatters, exposing the tight Kevlar beneath.  A thigh holster was strapped onto each leg, a machete strapped in one, a Swiss Army knife in the other; both were sharpened and deadly. Strapped to his back was a heavy quiver, weighted with hand-carved arrows, each whittled out of yew and topped with various heads; one of glass, another of metal—whatever he could get his hands on. All were crafted to perfection, despite the shoddy pieces that may have gone into their making.

 

Beside the man dangled a rope, thick and sturdy, twenty feet of cable swaying lightly in the breeze, leading to the fire escape. An escape route always came in handy, even at that height.

 

The breeze of the evening had become swift and insisted, tugging at the man like ghostly fingers, his ruddy cheeks flushed from the cold, though his back burned with the heat of the sun, but he did not waver atop the corner stone of the building, his gaze unfaltering as it stretched out across the silent streets of the city; a gale force wind could not budge this statue.

 

As he scanned his territory, the silent, motionless streets began to stir, like a sleeping dragon roused from its slumber. Movement began in the thrown shadows of the alleys, a lurking flurry, and his blue gaze tracked each flickering whisper, tracing whatever upheaval was beginning, even as his ears picked up a soft, tinkling toll of a bell.

 

It remained as such for some time; nothing but distant flashes, seen by only the keenest of eyes and that soft, chiming toll. And then it came into the light of the day, a group of Infected dashing from the shadows like rabid dogs, keening and roaring as they went, guttural voices lifted to his ears on the drift of the wind.

 

An arrow was notched as soon as the first undead creature reared its ugly head, but he did not shoot—not yet. Wasting an arrow on easy prey was foolish when it could be needed for survival. He simply watched, ever vigilant, and kept his bow readied; no matter their distance, no matter how little interest was shown towards his safe haven, one could never be too paranoid.

 

But then another flash of movement drew his gaze away from the small horde, and for the first time in a long while, his composed expression flashed with surprise, eyes widening as his mouth dropped open wide. For what he saw was unmistakable, as improbable as it may have seemed.

 

A man, small and willowy, and completely exposed to the light of the sun, stood immobile, watching the approaching horde grow closer and closer and, to the man’s bewilderment, his hands were lifted out; not in fear, no, they were limp and held high, like an invitation. He was beckoning the creatures, small frame bent forward, like he was calling home a runaway pet. Perhaps, if the man atop his perch listened hard enough, he would even hear the other man’s croons drifting up on the high winds as he called the rabid creatures to their feast. And they were getting close, tantalizingly close, to their prey.

 

There was no thought, no time for thought, as the arrow in the man’s grip was lifted and sent flying, tearing through the skull of the closest Infected; another arrow notched in the next moment, sent into the throat of the second, and then he was moving, an acrobat in his element as he flipped down from his perch, linking his arm around the awaiting rope and sliding down with practiced ease, landing with a thud on the fire escape.

 

Another arrow and another Infected crumbled to the ground in a slump of ragged bones and sagging skin.

 

From the fire escape he leapt from balcony to balcony, before leaping over the final edge to reach the sidewalk below.

 

He hit the ground hard, jarring his legs as the air in his lungs hissed out with pain; but he ignored it, dropping a fourth Infected with another arrow, black blood splattering the distant street corner.

 

The man, the man who’d offered himself up like some sacrificial lamb to slaughter, had not moved, but was instead slumping to his knees, staring at the fallen Infected and ignoring the final three that were moving in for their meal, as though thought for his own preservation had long since fled.

 

The archer pelted across the asphalt at top speed, sending off another arrow and dropping the closest corpse, finally calling out as he drew nearer.

 

“What the hell’re you doing?!” His voice was frantic and rough from disuse, and he slung his bow over his shoulder at the last moment, unsheathing the machete with a precise motion, buildings passing him in a blur before he came parallel with the grisly scene: two walking corpses, a woman and a man, horrible monsters going in for the kill, froth dripping from their mouths, clawed hands reaching out, brushing over the man’s curly hair. And the man, kneeling in a growing pool of Infected blood, head dipped low to his chest, hands lying limp on either side of him, unmoving, some sad creature excepting its undeniable fate.

 

This was a fate the archer simply could not allow.

 

His machete came down in a wide arc, embedding itself deep in the Infected man’s skull, spraying black ichor across everything around it. The husk of a man dropped like a sack of rocks, taking the machete with him, and the woman turned, her jaw broken, tongue lolled out and disturbingly wagging, hands lifting for the archer desperately.

 

He went for his Army knife, unsheathing it and dodging her clawed grasp, stumbling back when his boots encountered a fallen corpse. She followed after his faltering steps, moaning out in hunger and rage, and he fought a gag, parrying forward and slashing for the skin of her face, trying for the eyes and only slicing open the temple, black blood pouring down in a sudden torrent.

 

She did not relent and the archer was forced to pull his bow from around his back, brandishing it as a club, swinging with all his might as she came closer, blood and spittle mingling as she cried out towards him.

 

When his bow slammed into the side of her head, she fell, screaming a gargled cry, until a boot planted itself firmly over her throat and the archer bent forward, face twisted in a grimace as he jammed his knife straight into her eye-socket, and she spasmed and fell limp.

 

With a wet pop he withdrew the blade, lip curling in disgust as he wiped the black ooze and gore onto one torn pant leg, and then turned his sharp gaze towards the suicidal stranger.

 

He straightened, slowly, and came closer to the kneeling creature, watching the tremors that ran through the slumped shoulders, the soft, keening noise that must have been coming from the man’s mouth, the clenching and unclenching of those pale, thin hands.

 

It had been so long since the archer had seen a Survivor, so long since he’d done anything more than scale buildings and nest away from the crawling urchins; he’d been so alone for so long. Even if this Survivor seemed far from glad about their extended existence, the archer was so suddenly filled with appreciation, with some kind of frantic need for human contact, that he wasn’t even angry he’d wasted arrows to save this thin, crying mess of a human.

 

“Well, that didn’t work,” he said flippantly, stepping on one Infected’s back as he yanked his arrow from its skull, glad to see it was made of metal and had survived the intimate encounter with brain matter. A quick swipe on the leg of his pants was sufficient cleaning for now, he was sure. “Maybe try a bullet next time? Those are always pretty quick.”

 

As he tried to yank his machete from the Infected’s sliced skull, the kneeling man finally spoke, soft and broken whisper hardly heard over the archer’s grunt of effort. “I don’t deserve it,” was all he said, body bending closer to the bloody ground, under the heaviest of unseen burdens.

 

“Deserve what?” Sheathing the machete, the archer moved on to the next arrow, frowning when it broke, too far embedded in the skull to come out fully.

 

“A quick death.” This came louder, and the archer scented trouble on the air as he turned, anger in that feeble voice, those limp hands in fists once more, though the head stayed lowered. “A bullet’s too fast. These people, they deserve to rip me apart.”

 

The archer gave a full body twitch of revulsion at the thought—he’d seen it, he’d _heard_ it, an Infected’s meal time, the screaming, inhuman and horrible, the smell of human life ripped to shreds, the _image_ , so much blood and limbs thrown about—and he couldn’t imagine someone wishing for it, actively _searching_ for a way to receive it.

 

He spoke as if his stomach wasn’t turning inside out at the thought. “Well, buddy, sorry to disappoint yah—and they ain’t people, last I checked. Infected’re as much people as we are dogs.” He nudged one body with his boot, leaning to yank his arrow out of its head. “If I’d gotten the memo, though, I’d pro’lly have left yah to it, but I don’t get my rocks off to watchin’ execution, so I guess you’re stuck livin’ for a little while longer.” When he looked up, his gaze found a pair of burning brown eyes behind wire glasses and a pale, freckled face splattered with long-dried blood.

 

“You could have turned around.” His voice was quiet, almost calm, but laced with dangerous steel beneath, like a sword sheathed in velvet.

 

The archer shrugged, as though the idea didn’t leave his very skin crawling. The conviction, the _desire_ for death so plainly written into the lines of the man’s face, burning in the dark pools of his eyes, made the man feel distinctly sick to his stomach. “Guess so. But that really ain’t my style, so…” He trailed off, shrugging once more. “I watch and act. Not much thought in it, really.”

 

The man lowered his head once more, bringing his hands up to his chest and curling down on himself, taking a deep, shuddering breath. “Leave.” His voice was firm, and left no room for argument.

 

The other man had never liked being told what to do. “No. You're just gonna go run off and try again.”

“I said _leave._ ” His voice sounded deeper, a snarl as he curled further in, breathing ragged and shoulders heaving with the force of it. “ _Now.”_

 

“And I said no,” he replied, a cocky smirk forming on his face as he retrieved his final arrow, slotting them all back into his quiver and coming to stand before the kneeling man. “I’m gonna stay right here and watch’ya like a hawk, cause you’re an idiot and I’m feeling generous.”

 

“ _Fuck. Off.”_ He was shaking with rage now, and he lifted his head, lips pulled back in a sneer. “Fuck off now while I _let you._ ”

 

Snorting, the archer put his hands to his hips, looking the trembling man over. He was thin, malnourished; he wasn’t very tall; didn’t seem to have any weapons. He had nothing but a ratty lab coat and a pair of wire-rimmed glasses. He wouldn’t stand a chance in a fight against anyone, let alone the skilled fighter who stood in front of him.

 

Or, those were the assumptions made. “I’m terrified. Really.” The archer leant forward, slightly condescending, slightly intimidating, trying to assert the fact that he wasn’t about to leave. “I don’t scare easy, though, so…” Again, he trailed off with a shrug, straightening as the other man bent low again, hands bracing against the blood soaked ground.

 

“I tried,” the man mumbles, an oath or a prayer whispered almost too low for the other to hear, bloodied fingers curling into fists. “I warned. I tried. I _failed.”_ The word curled on the air, foul and bitter, and the archer crossed his arms over his chest. _Failed._ Hadn’t they all?

 

“O-kay, cryptic Survivor dude, let’s get this show pony on the r—”

 

 ** _“ Shut up!”_**  Something far stronger than anger fueled the words, something guttural and pained, and suddenly those bloody fists were slammed into the ground as the man’s mop top flew up, and a mad light burned deep in his eyes.

 

Electric green eyes.

 

The archer stumbled back, maybe in fear, mostly in surprise at the force of the shout, and had his bow in hand long before he made a conscious thought to grab it.

 

Those eyes. Acidic, venomous eyes; eyes he’d seen before, eyes so vivid they burned like a flame in the dark, effervescent smoke fit to hypnotize the mouse in a snakes enthrall; he’d seen them, so many times. A gaze for the harbinger of Death itself.

 

The little man was collapsing in on himself, shrinking impossibly smaller now, even as the poison that had infected his eyes spread into the thin veins of his arms, and, when he curled just so upon himself, it exposed the sides of his neck, contagion fanning out like green vines across his face.

 

The archer was as hard as steel, even in the face of all that he feared most in this world; not the Infected, not the End, not all the horrible, atrocious things he’d stood witness to long before society crumbled at the feet of the Disease; no, what lay kneeled at his feet now was above and beyond that, something that seemed to have crawled from the darkest corners of his fearful consciousness, something that could only have dragged itself from the very pits of some flaming hell.

 

As he stumbled back, dead Infected scattered at his feet, hand-carved bow gripped tight in his hands, the only words that found their way to his now trembling lips fell like weighted stones, a terror so great it was carved into the air.

 

_“Hellspawn.”_

**Author's Note:**

> This is a tough thingy to write so updates may be sporadic, if my inspiration doesn't tapper off and die all together--which I hope it does not. It shouldn't be too long--at most we're looking at three or four chapters, unless the fancy strikes me for more. Leave a kudos or comment if you'd like to see more, I suppose.


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